Boodjamulla National Park in north
western Queensland is one of those strange places where people whose
most vigorous daily activity is getting on and off the toilet (sadly
not a squat toilet) are suddenly impelled to walk for multiple
kilometres and even to canoe. Perhaps the bone-shaking six hour
drive on rutted red dirt tracks knocks loose some nerve junctions and
the resulting new synapses recall more ancient times (not
metaphorical) when their bodies did what all animals with legs are
meant to do, walk.
After our own neurone shattering drive,
we were excited to have two full days when we did not need to get
into the car and could walk, kayak, even run, and need only sit once
a day (remember, the latrines are not squat toilets). Our first day,
we only had time to walk up to the Cascades, a series of surreal tufa
formations where fallen trees are entombed in tufa deposited by the
mineral rich water. The water was low after a dry wet season and we
had to lie down to get wet in the water. As dusk fell, we hiked up a
set of stone stairs past red rocks radiating heat to a look-out on a
free standing island in Lawn Hill Creek where the red cliffs of the
gorge above deep green waters were visible through the lucullan
vegetation.
Boodjamulla Morning
Next morning, we had a pleasant few
hour amble along the tracks of the southern gorge. I wandered along
the inland route, past clumps of striking purple flowers in a shallow
gully between two broken ribs of red sandstone rock. A gentle track
leads up onto a plateau of flat red sandstone where you can look down
into the deep green waters of the upper gorge. A couple of paddlers
in rental canoes made V line streaks through the calm water.
Indarri Falls
The track drops abruptly down to creek
level and traverses a dirt path under large cabbage palms, each side
of the narrow track strewn with the debris of wet season floods. At
Middle Gorge, a shallow tufa falls separates the Upper and Middle
Gorges. Cabbage and pandanus palms flourish, and the deep red cliffs
fall sheer into the water. I swam in the clear green waters diving
off the swimming pontoon and lazily floating under the small
waterfalls.
The next section of track weaves around
red rock slabs, through small rock cliffs and junctions, and climbs
to a viewpoint of the falls, continuing in a lackadaisical fashion
past other view points and sculpted red sandstone outcrops to look
over the Constance Range and the grassy plains of the camping area.
Another set of stone steps leads down to river level and a cement
path, overhung with clusters of palms runs along the river past
swimming platforms to the campground.
There are three other marked walks in
Boodjamulla, one circles the island stack and gives good views down
to the green waters of Lawn Hill Creek. A second leads along the
base of the island stack to an old aboriginal camp area where there
are some faded rock art drawings and shell middens. Along the way,
this walk passes under stunning red cliffs filled with corners,
dihedrals and faces, a climbers dream if you could climb without
violating indigenous dream-time beliefs.
My favourite walk was the short stroll
(non-walkers would not call this a stroll) up to the Constance Range.
The track wanders downstream along Lawn Hill creek and then climbs
up red rock slabs and steps onto the escarpment of the Constance
Range where an expansive view stretches away across a millennial old
landscape of Mitchell Grass and eucalpyt.
Waterfall swimming
It is a lazy paddle upstream between
towering red rock cliffs to the tufa falls at Indarri, and there is a
built portage track to carry boats to the upper gorge, where red rock
cliffs continue for another half kilometre before subsiding into the
surrounding Constance Range. At the end, the deep creek abruptly
shallows to a series of ankle deep braided channels lined with large
paperbarks. If you paddle after lunch, the gorge is eerily quiet as
the hire canoes go out only in the mornings.
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